* IBM’s BladeCenter servers matched with Topspin InfiniBand technology
IBM and Topspin announced last week that Topspin’s InfiniBand switches and host channel adapters will be incorporated into IBM’s BladeCenter servers.
The two companies collaborated on the development to deliver 80G bit/sec of connectivity to IBM eServer BladeCenter chassis, storage, network and servers. InfiniBand will serve as an interconnect to cluster servers and offload processing by using remote direct memory access technology.
The package is designed for database clusters, grids, and high-performance and on-demand computing environments.
InfiniBand, a standards-based interconnect technology, lets IT managers cluster servers and provide fast access to shared services and resources. Many of the Supercomputing Top500 servers are clustered with InfiniBand host channel adapters and switches. In fact, 42 IBM BladeCenter clusters are on this list.
InfiniBand incorporation has accelerated over the last year. Topspin last week announced that it has shipped 10,000 switch ports to customers in the last quarter.
The new BladeCenter servers feature a Topspin IB Switch Module and a Topspin IB Host Channel Adapter Expansion Card. Topspin also includes its VFrame server virtualization software, which allows applications and operating system images to be provisioned to blades as needed.
Topspin demonstrated its IBM BladeCenter package at SC2004 last week. The demo highlighted IBM Tivoli Intelligent Orchestrator software and Topspin’s VFrame provisioning blades.
The relationship between IBM and Topspin is not new. IBM has offered Topspin technology in its xSeries x336 and x346 servers, its eServer 325/326 and its IBM eServer Cluster 1350.
The IBM/Topspin InfiniBand-enabled BladeCenters are expected to be available in December.
Topspin has also announced product support by Dell, HP, NEC and Sun. The company claims to have signed 60-plus new customers in the last quarter. The company’s host channel adapters work in Linux, Windows and Unix host computers.
